Agency A-List: 72andSunny, Los Angeles

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Last year, 72andSunny had just begun to chip away at the fortress that was Apple marketing,
thanks to a clever bunch of spots that took jabs at iPhone-toting hipsters. Now, you could say
its jabs have turned to knockout punches, thanks to what was one of 2012's most viral
campaigns, Samsung's "The Next Big Thing is Already Here."

While Apple fans have had a strong cult-like coterie for a long time, 72andSunny's mission
was to create a "Samsung Nation" that could have its own fanboys (and girls.) The result was
a series of on-point spots that showed off GS 3's innovative features while poking good-
natured fun at those who hadn't switched yet. The timing of the campaigns always coincided
with Apple OS product updates and the jokes never got cruel enough to turn off would-be
Samsung adopters. It also collaborated with LeBron James for "LeBron's Day," a film that
showed the basketball star going about his day ahead of a game that cleverly aired just
before an actual basketball game.

And that wasn't all. For Activision, the SoCal agency continued to make waves, following up
on last year's buddy-film, "The Vet and the N00b," starring Jonah Hill and Sam Worthington,
with "Surprise," which featured the even more high-octane Robert Downey Jr., along with
internet celebrity iJustine and French film star Omar Sy. That film was the culmination of a
months-long campaign for Call of Duty: Black Ops III, which had notable moments with a web
video by weapons vlogger FPS Russia "testing" out the futuristic weapons from the game, and
a film starring real-life war experts Ollie North and P.W. Singer talking about the war of the
future. That film, shot in a History Channel documentary-esque manner, turned out to be just
another brilliant way to promote the film, which turned out to be kind of scary because the
scenarios presented were entirely plausible. For both its big name clients, the agency churned
out work that was truly creative, but also had that magic touch that raised sales and
awareness of the brand itself.

The agency's partners, who we named to our 2012 Creativity 50, also made
some key hires, including Frank Hahn of Wieden + Kennedy Tokyo and Shanghai, and Scott
Trattner of Media Arts Lab.